St. Louis Area Foodbank to Receive Semi Truckload of 39,900 Pounds of Donated Pet Food – Nearly 190,000 Meals – from PetSmart’s Buy a Bag, Give a Meal™ Program

Pet Food Is a Rare Offering at Food Banks and Pantries; Pet Families
in Need Often Feed Human Food to Pets or Face Impossible Decision to
Surrender Pets; Massive Pet Food Donation Aimed at Feeding Hungry Pets
in Need, Keeping St. Louis-Area Pets with their Families

–(BUSINESS WIRE)–PetSmart:

What:

The St. Louis Area Foodbank is about to receive its largest pet
food donation in its 42-year history. A 53-foot semi truck loaded
with nearly 190,000 pet food meals, nearly 40,000 pounds, will be
distributed Friday, Sept. 8, to various agencies who will come by
the St. Louis Area Foodbank to pick up loads of the 38-pound bags.

This significant pet food donation is from PetSmart’s Buy a
Bag, Give a Meal program, where for every bag of dog or cat
food purchased in its 1,500-plus stores or online through Dec. 31,
2017, the retailer will donate a meal to a pet in need. Through
this historic program, which PetSmart launched in celebration of
its 30th anniversary this year, it expects to donate 60
million meals* – nearly 13 million pounds – to pets in need at
hundreds of animal welfare agencies across North America, as well
as human food banks, pantries and meal programs, where pet food is
a rare offering.

Pet food is a rare offering at food banks and pantries across
America, and pet families in need often feed their pets human food
that may already be scarce for their family, or face the
impossible decision of surrendering their pet because they can’t
afford to feed them.

And yet, studies show that people need their pets more than ever
when facing life’s challenges. The human-animal bond is a powerful
source of unconditional love and support for families. In fact, in
a recent PetSmart
Charities-commissioned survey, 94 percent of respondents
agreed that pets are essential to maintaining good mental and
physical health. That’s why PetSmart, together with its nonprofit
partner PetSmart
Charities, wants to help keep people and pets together through
this massive pet food donation that will help St. Louis families
who may rely on food banks or pantries to now have access to
delicious, nutritious food for their four-legged friends.

To get the significant pet food donation to hundreds of agencies
in local markets across North America, like the St. Louis Area
Foodbank, PetSmart is working with nonprofit partner PetSmart
Charities, the leading funder of animal welfare in North
America, which is teaming up with GreaterGood.org’s Rescue
Bank program and Feeding
America, two renowned national nonprofit organizations. These
organizations are getting the pet food quickly and efficiently to
hungry pets in need.

The St. Louis Area Foodbank is the only Feeding America affiliate
food bank in the region and supports 500 nonprofit agencies such
as food pantries and meal programs across the St. Louis metro
area. Now the Foodbank will help feed hungry pets too!

Two additional semi truckloads of donated pet food from PetSmart
will be delivered later this year and into 2018.

When:

Friday, Sept. 8, 10 a.m. – noon

Where:

St. Louis Area Foodbank

70 Corporate Woods Drive

Bridgeton, MO 63044

Photo Ops:

• Local PetSmart store team helping load up nonprofit agencies’
trucks with the 38-pound bags of donated pet food. These nonprofit
agencies operate food pantries and meal programs, and are served
by the St. Louis Area Foodbank.

• The volume of pet food donated – pallets stored at St. Louis
Area Foodbank.

Interviews:

• St. Louis Area Foodbank agency partners sharing what this
donation means to the clients they serve in the local St. Louis
area.

• St. Louis Area Foodbank representative commenting on the local
impact of this significant pet food donation.

• PetSmart and PetSmart Charities discussing the Buy a Bag,
Give a Meal program and its impact on pets in need.

Call to Action:

• People in the local St. Louis area can continue to help pets in
need through PetSmart’s Buy a Bag, Give a Meal program –
buy bags of dog and cat food at PetSmart and the retailer will
donate a meal to a pet in need for every bag sold.

The St. Louis Area Foodbank began its service to the community in 1975.
Since that time, the organization has grown to become the bi-state
region’s largest nonprofit 501(c)(3) food distribution center dedicated
to feeding those in need. Through a network of 500 partner agencies in
26 counties in Missouri and Illinois, the Foodbank distributes over 42
million pounds of food and personal care items annually. More than
392,000 people in the bi-state region rely on the Foodbank for
assistance each year. For more information on the organization and the
issue of hunger, please visit STLFoodbank.org.

About PetSmart®

PetSmart, Inc. is the largest specialty pet retailer of services and
solutions for the lifetime needs of pets. At PetSmart, we love pets, and
we believe pets make us better people. Every day with every connection,
PetSmart’s passionate associates help bring pet parents closer to their
pets so they, together, can live more fulfilled lives. This vision
impacts everything we do for our customers, the way we support our
associates and how we give back to our communities. We employ
approximately 55,000 associates, operate more than 1,500 pet stores in
the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico, as well as more than 200
in-store PetSmart® PetsHotel® dog and cat boarding facilities. PetSmart
provides a broad range of competitively priced pet food and products, as
well as pet-focused services such as dog training, pet grooming, pet
boarding, PetSmart® Doggie Day Camp® and pet adoption. PetSmart,
together with non-profits PetSmart Charities® and PetSmart Charities™ of
Canada, invite more than 3,000 animal welfare organizations to bring
adoptable pets into stores so they have the best chance possible of
finding a forever home. Through this in-store adoption program and other
signature events, PetSmart has facilitated more than 7.4 million
adoptions – more than any other brick-and-mortar organization. The
company’s portfolio of digital resources for pet parents includes
PetSmart.com, OnlyNaturalPet.com, petMD.com, Pawculture.com, AllPaws, an
online pet adoption platform that helps potential pet parents find the
perfect pet to adopt based on their home, family and lifestyle, as well
as BlogPaws, the world’s first pet blogger and influencer network.
Through these digital platforms, PetSmart offers the most comprehensive
online pet supplies and pet care information in the U.S. In celebration
of its 30th anniversary, PetSmart launched its Buy a Bag, Give a Meal™
program in March 2017. For every bag of cat or dog food purchased March
1 – Dec. 31, 2017, PetSmart will donate a meal to pets in need and
expects to donate more than 60 million meals in 2017*. In May 2017,
PetSmart acquired Chewy.com, a leading online retailer of pet food and
products in the U.S., which operates as an independent subsidiary.

*Ends 12/31/17. 5 oz. dog food, 1.5 oz. cat food donated to PetSmart
Charities to feed dogs and cats in need. See details at
petsmart.com/giveameal. The actual number of meals donated is based on
dog and cat food bags sold. The meal donation estimate is based on
historic sales for similar time periods. No guaranteed amount. Rescue
Bank and Feeding America will help distribute a large portion of the pet
food donation in the U.S., while four large animal welfare agencies will
distribute it in Canada.

About PetSmart Charities®

PetSmart
Charities, Inc. is a nonprofit animal welfare organization with a
mission to find lifelong, loving homes for all pets by supporting
programs and thought leadership that bring people and pets together. In
addition to finding homes for almost 500,000 shelter pets each year
through its in-store adoption program in all PetSmart stores across the
U.S. and Puerto Rico, PetSmart Charities provides funding to non-profits
aligned with its mission through four key areas of grant support:
Preventing Pet Homelessness; Helping Shelter Pets Thrive; Supporting the
Bond Between People and Pets; and Emergency Relief and Disaster
Support. Each year, millions of generous PetSmart shoppers help pets in
need by donating to PetSmart Charities using the pin pads at checkout
registers inside PetSmart stores. In turn, PetSmart Charities
efficiently uses 90 cents of every dollar donated and has become the
leading funder of animal welfare in North America, donating about $300
million to date. PetSmart Charities, a 501(c)(3) organization, has
received the Four Star Rating from Charity Navigator, an independent
organization that reports on the effectiveness, accountability and
transparency of nonprofits, for the past 14 years in a row — placing it
among the top one percent of charities rated by this organization. To
learn more visit www.petsmartcharities.org.